Energy lawyers warn against dominance of E.ON and RWE after deal

Der Spiegel

If the asset swap of energy companies and utilities RWE and E.ON goes ahead as planned, the resulting company would have “unprecedented market power”, Ines Zenke from energy law firm Becker Büttner Held told Frank Dohmen at Der Spiegel. The lawyer represents several municipal utilities and other energy companies who want to prevent the merger. Green power supplier Lichtblick warns in the article that the combined force of RWE and E.ON would deal a heavy blow to the already thin competition on the German market. After the deal, E.ON could cover two thirds of Germany and over 70 percent of all power customers, and it would dominate around half of the German power grid as well as smart meters and e-car charging stations, Lichtblick says. Competition agencies in Brussels and Bonn are looking into the merger now but so far RWE and E.ON both say they don’t see any serious obstacles to its approval, the author writes.

In 2018, RWE and E.ON agreed on a substantial asset swap that will leave E.ON focused on energy networks and retail customers while RWE will focus on power production and to this end receive E.ON and innogy’s renewable electricity production.